PrestaShop is a French born open source platform bought in February 2026 by the Polish group Cyber_Folks for roughly 53.8 million euros, and its live store count fell about 13 percent year on year to just under 160,000. The software is free, but a fully working store costs around 30,000 to 50,000 Czech crowns a year in modules, a theme and developer time, because roughly 80 percent of the features are paid. For a technically equipped merchant selling into several countries it still makes sense. For a non technical one, the module economy and the pain of upgrades are a strong argument against.
Comparison table
The facts in one place first. Figures as of July 2026.
| Item | PrestaShop (self hosted) | Type |
|---|---|---|
| Software (core) | 0 CZK | open source |
| Hosting | about 150 to 400 CZK/month | mandatory |
| Domain | about 250 to 350 CZK/year | mandatory |
| Theme | about 1,200 to 8,000 CZK | usually needed |
| Paid modules | about 80 percent of features | 30 to 550 USD each |
| Developer | 60 to 80 EUR/hour | close to unavoidable |
| Real yearly total | about 30,000 to 50,000 CZK | estimate from practice |
Indicative costs of a self hosted PrestaShop store in 2026, in Czech crowns as originally published. PrestaShop Hosted is an alternative from 24 EUR a month paid annually. The yearly total comes from practitioners on the Czech ecommerce forum Webtrh.
The new owner, and why that is not a footnote
Before a single number about prices, start with the news that occupied most of European ecommerce in February 2026. PrestaShop changed hands. The Fortidia group completed its sale to a company owned by the Polish group Cyber_Folks for roughly 53.8 million euros. Cyber_Folks runs a competing SaaS platform of its own, Shoper, and holds a stake in the headless framework Sylius.
Why open an article about whether PrestaShop is still worth it with ownership? Because a new owner with a competing platform of their own is a large unknown for the future of the product. And the sale was not the end of it. In April 2026 the French leadership announced a formal collective restructuring, a so called employment safeguard plan. How many people it touches was never made public.
The numbers back up the unease. According to StoreLeads, just under 160,000 live stores were running on PrestaShop at the end of May 2026, about 13 percent fewer than a year earlier. For comparison, in 2022 the figure was around 220,000. The platform is not dead, but it is shrinking, and that is not something I would sweep under the rug while choosing.
Nine, eight, and the upgrade you cannot avoid
Technically PrestaShop in 2026 straddles two lines. The modern version 9 and the maintained version 8 ship in parallel, currently 9.1.4 and 8.2.7. Version 9 brought a new default theme, Hummingbird 2.0, which complies with the European Accessibility Act out of the box, and it runs on PHP 8.5 and Symfony 6.4 with long term support.
The catch is in version 8. It still runs on Symfony 4.4, which is no longer supported, so moving to 9 is a matter of when rather than whether. And migration between major PrestaShop versions is precisely the point where it hurts a lot of merchants, as we will get to.
What a working PrestaShop store actually costs
Now for the part you came for. The software itself is open source and free to download, and there is a managed PrestaShop Hosted option from 24 euros a month paid annually. On the classic self hosted version, which is what I see most often, the licence is the smallest of the costs.
You pay for hosting, a domain, a theme and above all modules. You need plenty of those, because roughly 80 percent of the features are paid. A single module runs somewhere between 30 and 550 dollars, a decent theme 50 to 330, and on top of that you almost always need a developer at 60 to 80 euros an hour. Put together, the real yearly cost of a fully working store comes to around 30,000 to 50,000 Czech crowns according to practitioners on Webtrh, the main Czech ecommerce forum. I have kept that figure in crowns rather than converting it, because a made up exchange rate would help nobody. What transfers is the multiple against a licence of zero, not the sum.
That is what the word free hides. Zero is the entry code. The bill for a store that can actually sell adds up somewhere else, at the modules and at the person who wires them together and keeps them running.
Where it hurts most: modules and upgrades
The module economy has one more unpleasant side. Modules do not always play well together and with enough of them you risk conflicts, where two add-ons fight over the same territory. Resolving one of those without a developer is a superhuman task.
The sharpest edge is the upgrade. Roughly every two years a major update arrives and merchants report the same thing over and over: after the upgrade, modules they paid for stop working and have no replacement. You pay for a feature, lose it in a major update, and sometimes there is nothing to swap it for. That, to me, is the biggest hidden tax on PrestaShop and no price list mentions it.
Let me be blunt. Without a permanent developer, or at least somebody on call who knows PHP, PrestaShop is a road you will get stuck on sooner or later. That is not a criticism of the code, which is decent. It is the reality of running it without a technical bench.
Who PrestaShop still suits
So this does not read as a hatchet job, PrestaShop has real strengths left. It is strong across Europe, with most of its stores in France, Spain and Italy, and multi language and multi currency selling work natively and work well. Anyone selling into several countries and languages will appreciate that.
It also has a solid community, more than five thousand merchants in Czechia alone, along with local translations and sites full of local modules. If you have the technical bench and you want open source with no monthly licence and full control of the code, it is a legitimate choice. It is the phrase technical bench that makes the whole difference, though. Without it, the advantage turns into a burden fast.
An alternative without the module arithmetic
If what attracts you to PrestaShop is having everything under control, but the module arithmetic and the upgrades put you off, it is worth comparing against an all in one platform. In Behio, stock, invoicing, B2B, a loyalty programme, product feeds for comparison sites and analytics are included rather than paid add-ons that break after an update.
The operating philosophy differs too. You host, update and repair PrestaShop yourself or through a developer. Behio is a managed platform where hosting, updates and security are not your concern at all, and the storefront is still real Next.js code you can export, so ownership and lock in are not the trade. Paid plans start at 390 Czech crowns a month, order volume is never capped, and it is built for the Czech and Slovak markets from the ground up.
The verdict
PrestaShop is not dead, but 2026 did nothing for its stability. A new Polish owner with a competing platform, a restructuring in France and a 13 percent year on year drop in live stores are signals I would not ignore while choosing. The software is free, yet the real cost of a working store climbs to 30,000 to 50,000 Czech crowns a year in modules, a theme and a developer, and upgrades can break the very things you paid for. For a merchant with a developer and international sales it still makes sense. For a non technical one, a managed all in one platform is the better move today, where features are not paid add-ons and an upgrade never breaks what you bought.
Common questions
Yes. In February 2026 the Fortidia group completed the sale of PrestaShop to a company owned by the Polish group Cyber_Folks for roughly 53.8 million euros. Cyber_Folks also runs the competing SaaS platform Shoper. In April 2026 the French leadership announced a collective restructuring as well.
The software is free, but a fully working store comes to around 30,000 to 50,000 Czech crowns a year in practice. That covers hosting, a domain, a theme, paid modules (roughly 80 percent of the features) and developer work at 60 to 80 euros an hour.
Because roughly every two years a major update arrives, and after it purchased modules often stop working with no replacement available. On top of that, modules fight each other over the same features and the conflicts are hard to resolve without a developer.
Eventually yes. Version 8 runs on Symfony 4.4, which is no longer supported, so the move to 9 is a necessity. Version 9 runs on PHP 8.5 and Symfony 6.4 with long term support and ships the Hummingbird 2.0 theme, which complies with the European Accessibility Act.
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